Design for the Other 90%

"The numbers seem nutty. There are 6.5 billion people on this planet, 90 percent of whom can't afford basic products and services. Half of them, nearly three billion people, don't have regular access to food, shelter or clean water. Yet whenever we think, or talk, about design, it's invariably about something that's intended to be sold to one of the privileged minority - the richest 10 percent." So begins Alice Rawsthorn in her sharp review of "Design for the Other 90%," a new exhibition at The Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum in New York, which opened on Friday. The show looks at 30 humanitarian design projects that cover the basic needs of shelter, health, water, education, energy and transport. Some projects were invented by their users, others by design professionals, and many were collaborations. Read the rest of Rawsthorn's review here, and be sure to look at the slide show, too. Shown here is the Sierra portable light mat, created by women weavers in the San Andreas region of the Sierra Madre, Mexico as an illuminating rug powered by a combination of LEDs, switches and rechargeable batteries. It is currently being tested in Mexico and Australia.

Jane Austen Portrait

Is this the face of Jane Austen? The painting shown here, known as the Rice Portrait of Jane Austen (after a former owner, Henry Rice) was by society artist Ozias Humphry. It came to wider notice in 1884, when it appeared on the cover of a first edition of Jane Austen's letters collection. There has been much debate over the authenticity of the portrait ever since, but the Christie's auction house in New York supports those who claim it is Austen, putting the portrait up for auction on April 19, where it was expected to fetch between $400,000 and $800,000 (USD). More on the story here. I rather think it's the real thing––if you compare it with the only authenticated portrait of Jane Austen, the drawing by her sister Cassandra, the features and proportions are the same (albeit softened and flattered in the painting).

Eames Cards

Apartment Therapy has a fun little post on the classic Charles and Ray Eames "House of Cards" set, created in 1952. Regina writes, "It's a picture deck of cards made with 6 slots that allow for endless imaginative building. Each card is printed with a different photo, most of which are closeups of common objects." DIY sculpture, endlessly reconfigurable. More on the Eames here.

Globe & Mail Illustration

I have an illustration in today's Globe and Mail newspaper, on the front page of the Report on Business (ROB) section, accompanying the Profit by Design article by Gordon Pitts. It's about the dynamics between "...the bean counters and the creative free spirits and visionaries," and how business needs design to thrive in a competitive market. You can read the story here, though the illustration doesn't accompany the online version.

May 4 update: If you missed my post here and were wondering if that was really my illo on Tuesday, it's because my credit line was accidentally omitted when this article went to press (the Globe launched a complete redesign of the paper the day before, but inevitably there were a few wrinkles here and there that didn't get ironed out in time). As always, the Globe design team was stellar and let me know immediately. My credit line ran the next day.

Booklist: A History of Graphic Design

I've just added A History of Graphic Design by Philip Meggs to my list of design library essentials. It's probably the most comprehensive book on design available, with a hefty price to match: around $103.00 Canadian. Looks gorgeous––have a peek inside here.

Aria

Victoria of the SFGirlbyBay blog has been guest blogging on Design*Sponge for the last two weeks--her final post for D*S is a guide to her favourite sources in San Francisco, a wonderful list of shops that includes Aria, shown here. Victoria writes, "Just over the hill in North Beach (our own Little Italy) is the one of a kind shop Aria. They carry just about everything you never knew you were looking for. Owner Bill Haskell rounds up the coolest, and the oddest of oddities and there's usually some melancholy French music drifting in the air. This is just a wonderful old shop to linger in after a cappuccino at one of the many Italian cafes nearby." Sounds like the perfect way to spend a weekend! Check out the rest of her source picks here. Via Design*Sponge.

Marshmallows

Lemon marshmallows, by Muji. Elegantly minimalist like all of their products, to me these look like they're made of porcelain, designed for display. But then, anything from Muji is a good thing. Via tastespotting.

Literacy for Leaders

"Best-selling Canadian author Yann Martel, worried about Prime Minister Stephen Harper's apparent lack of interest in the arts, sent him a book on Monday and said he would continue doing so once a fortnight. Martel, who wrote the novel "Life of Pi," was upset that Harper had paid no attention during a recent parliamentary ceremony to honor Canadian artists." Read the rest of the Reuters story here. Follow Martel's Harper book campaign here. Via the Arts Journal.

Fjorn Scandinavian

Fjorn Scandinavian is a US-based company specializing in Scandinavian linens, blankets and woolens, children's toys, tableware and home accessories, all hand made. Shown here is the wonderful Wild Horse Candelabrum, designed and built by the Swedish team of Bengt & Lotta, who are both illustrators as well as designers. Via the red.house blog.

Fooling the Eye

"Between 11 and 25 March, Swiss artist Felice Varini and his team created an unusual piece of public art that is set to baffle and fascinate visitors to Cardiff Bay barrage." View what he came up with on the BBC site here. Be sure to look at the photos in sequence, right up to the punchline (so to speak) at the end. Via Design Observer.

Eat the Seasons

Eat the Seasons "... aims to promote an understanding of food seasons. Each week we list the seasonal foods that are at their peak, and share enlightening facts, useful tips and enticing recipe ideas picked from the web and our favourite books." It's a nicely designed site, too, encouraging everyone to eat more local, seasonal food in a positive way. Besides the immediate benefits of enjoying fresher and more nutritous produce, other good reasons to do so include the reduction of energy (and associated CO2 emissions) used for growing and transporting food, price (you pay a premium on shipped food), supporting local farmers, and (especially for city dwellers) a way to reconnect with nature's cycles. Bon appétit!

Booklist: The Iron Whim

The Iron Whim: A Fragmented History of Typewriting, is (to quote the publisher's blurb) "...an intelligent, irreverent, and humorous history that traces the haphazard trajectory of the typewriter’s development and its various evolutionary dead ends." Sounds like a good read, with various anecdotes along the way involving Henry James, early typewriter salesmen, vampires and monkeys. Via the Design Observer.

Design Flops

Why are so many new designs so bad? Alice Rawsthorn finds eight good reasons, discussing them here. Be sure to check out the slide show, too. Shown here is an installation by Christoph Büchel at the Coppermill gallery in London, which encorporates junk parts from failed machinery. (photo: Mike Bruce/ Hauser & Wirth Zurich London)

Victoria

Victoria of the sfgirlbybay blog is guest blogging on the Design*Sponge blog for the next two weeks, where she'll be writing about affordable design in week 1, then her hometown (San Francisco) in week 2. As you can see here, she's a fantastic stylist, and puts her formidable flea market bargaining skills to brilliant effect in her own apartment. She writes of this photo, "I found this beautiful buffet at a yard sale, covered in hideous beige paint. Again, I carted into the back of my bug and took it to my mum's garage where I stripped off all the paint amidst highly toxic fumes, sanded it and polished up the natural wood. And the pièce de résistance? It was just $5!" Inspiring stuff. Read her D*S guest blog here.

Illustration Gallery

"A new gallery specialising in fashion illustration, Fig, has opened in west London. Its director, William Ling, arranged the first solo exhibitions for young British artists Gavin Turk, Adam Chodzko and Simon Periton. He believes the work of fashion illustrators has been dismissed as "applied" art and overlooked by the market. On Friday, Fig opens an exhibition of illustrations from the 1950s to the present, many from the archives of Vogue magazine. Prices will range from £800 to £10,000 for the drawing above, made by René Gruau for Harper's Bazaar." Read other art news by the Telegraph's Colin Gleadell here.

Chocolate Easter Billboard

A giant (14.5ft by 9.5ft) solid chocolate Easter billboard was created on April 3 by Thorntons, a UK chocolate firm. Placed in Covent Garden, London, it was made of 10 chocolate bunnies, 72 giant chocolate eggs and 128 chocolate panels, each weighing 2kg. It took three months to plan, 300 hours for a team of 10 to build and was expected to last a week. "As the billboard was unveiled, 50 girls from the Brownies turned up on a chocolate finding mission." Three hours later, the billboard was gone. Via the BBC. More photos of the event can be seen on the yumsugar blog, too.

Happy Easter!

Alvar Aalto

The Barbican Art Gallery in London currently has a retrospective of the brilliant Finnish architect Alvar Aalto's career, curated by the leading Japanese architect Shigeru Ban. Called "Alvar Aalto: Through the Eyes of Shigeru Ban," it examines Aalto's career beyond the furniture and vases he is mostly remembered for today. It runs until May 13. Read Alan Riding's IHT review here.

From the review, a great Aalto quote from a speech given in London in 1957 demonstrates his humanistic approach to architecture and design: "We should work for simple, good, undecorated things, but things which are in harmony with the human being and organically suited to the little man in the street."

Joy Division Sneakers

New Balance has produced a Joy Division tribute sneaker, with tongue and insole elements based on the design of Joy Division’s iconic first album cover. There seems to be some uncertainty about whether they'll go into full production or not, but either way it strikes me as a curious choice for sneaker inspiration, if you're (a) familiar with the band's music and (b) know what they named their band after. More photos and info can be found on the Hypebeast site here. Via Design Observer.

Clutch Vernissage

There will be a vernissage for the Clutch SPRING show at Timothy's Coffee Shop (541 Sussex Drive) on Wednesday, April 4 at 5:30 pm. Featuring the work of Clare Brennan, Alain Brunet, Jim Kohan, Michael Zavacky (Zeke) and special guest artist Jan Soetermans, the SPRING show runs for the month of April, 2007. Meet the artists and view their work in a relaxed and friendly atmosphere. More info about Clutch here.

Loop Pillow

I quite like this––the linen Loop pillow by Anki Spets, available from Design Public. It's got a retro feel, but it doesn't feel like a laboured recreation––just fresh and pretty, with a great scribbly pattern. Via Design*Sponge.

The Plagiarism Museum

"On Apr. 1, a new museum of counterfeit goods opens in the German city of Solingen, near Cologne. The Museum Plagiarius, housed in a converted railway building, will permanently exhibit 300 original products together with seemingly identical rip-offs. These items range from fashion and household products to electrical and medical equipment. They come from the annual Plagiarius awards, presented by the museum's co-founder Professor Rido Busse at the world's largest consumer-goods trade fair Ambiente, which takes place each February in Frankfurt." Read the rest of Rachel Tiplady's BusinessWeek article here. Via Design Observer.